


sweet like honey

by girljustdied



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-15
Updated: 2017-10-15
Packaged: 2019-10-03 07:33:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17279726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girljustdied/pseuds/girljustdied
Summary: maia and jace are locked in orbit.





	sweet like honey

**Author's Note:**

  * For [firstaudrina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstaudrina/gifts).



> post "beside still water."  
> prompt was "it’s summer, which means / my skin is all honey / before noon."

wildflower honey punch  
1.5 oz jack daniels honey  
0.5 oz white sangria  
0.5 oz wildflower honey water  
1 oz lemon juice  
1 oz orange juice  
dash of angostura bitters  


Life is sweet. Drinks spilling over glass rims onto her knuckles, sticky but cool to the touch. Mornings kissed awake. Nights a din of voices again, the Hunter’s Moon crowded with familiar faces.

And Jace, frowning at the cocktail she slides over the bar to him with a simple “Hi.”

“What does a man have to do for a beer from you?” He’s unserious, already slipping into the groove they’d carved out together and tracking its circular patterns. 

Her cheeks prickle with responses that take little thought and mean nothing. Chooses, “A man? Where?”

His smile is faint—no fight in it, no teeth. “You seem good.”

It’s an easy appraisal, and not untrue. Things are good. But things had been good, before. And things had been good, before that. And again and again, all the way back to when she’d read her first book. First learned to escape. She can’t forget.

“You keep saying that,” she rasps after a shot of honeyed whiskey, chin up. Mocks, “ _You seem good._ ”

“I’ll tell you what,” he drinks without further fuss, and licks his lips to catch any escaping sweetness, “when it changes, I promise I’ll keep it to myself.”

“When?” A challenge.

“If,” he gives her, lifting his cup in a faux salute. 

Shoots back, “I guess, if nothing else, I could look forward to you shutting the hell up.”

He blinks. 

She doesn’t have it in her to tell him how he seems lately: burnt out, carrying a secret. Finds herself asking, “How are you?” 

Instead of responding, he purses his mouth tightly and scans the bar as if he’s expecting someone else.

Oh. “How’s Clary?” 

“Meeting me here.” His short response is less terse and more matter of fact. Winds up, “And as for how I’m doing, I have to say, it’s sweet of you to ask. A bit disconcerting coming from you, but I—”

“Forget I said anything, Shadowhunter.” 

There it is, the smirk. And there it is, dimming almost immediately.

It eats at her. “You should be happy. You know that, right?”

Infuriatingly, he frowns more deeply, head drifting down so that his hair slides forward to hang over his eyes. “That so?”

“I’m happy.” 

His face softens, but he doesn’t follow up with questions about her and Simon. 

She presses on as if he had. “Simon’s working back into a normal routine—college and all. Got a big test tomorrow so he’s been holed up at his mom’s for days.” She digs her phone out of her apron and shows Jace a dorky, posed picture of Simon cross-eyed with glasses he no longer needs. 

Jace’s eyes are startling. One clear blue, the other half blue-half brown. “Cute.”

“Extremely cute,” she corrects. 

His gaze narrows as he takes a closer look at the picture. “You sure he’s at his mother’s?” 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Shrugs, “I don’t know. Can I have another drink?”

She pours them both a shot. Watches him toss his back, his throat as he swallows—then gulps down her own, a separate action. The sting of alcohol quickly shifts to a promising tingle of numbness.

He changes the subject. “Do you remember when I first found out I was a Herondale?”

“Landed me in jail,” she means to tease, but can feel her features pulling into a less than playful scowl. “How could I forget?”

“Do you also happen to remember me busting you out of said jail?” 

“It’s not any different. Putting me in, pulling me out …” Her jaw clenches shut and she shakes her head, no words to express the anger she cannot separate from gratitude, the anguish from being set free. 

“It’s still about power,” his voice making her own point startles her. “And not your own. I get it, okay?”

She tries to calm sudden nerves with a breath, then another. Sighs, heartbeat still elevated and uneven, “Okay, say whatever it is you were gearing up to say. Wham, suddenly you’re a Herondale, and?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“If you say so,” her pitch lilting up with each word, disbelieving but all too willing to let it go. 

He isn’t: “There’s too much history. It doesn’t just fade away when the truth comes out—it’s all true. It’s all a part of me. You know?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m really trying with,” Clary’s name left just unsaid, “everything.”

“I know.”

They relax with another shot, and another. She shouldn’t be drinking this much. She has a shift and side work to finish, and other customers. Ones that aren’t blond shadowhunters. 

“Maia,” he murmurs.

She hums an affirmative, leans towards him over the bar. Its edge digs into her hip and her fingertips skate against his. She can barely feel it. 

“I don’t think we should have sex again.”

It’s too much. A wild, high-pitched guffaw bursts out from her, begins a long round of laughter so infectious that the room begins to join in as Jace sets cash on the lacquered wood to close out his tab and leaves.

.

  
bee sting  
1.5 oz svedka jalapeno grapefruit  
1 oz lemon juice  
1 oz orange blossom honey water  
splash of grapefruit juice  


She wants to hit something.

They walk in parallel, Jace matching her long strides. When she shifts left to cross the street, he steps down from the curb before even she does. Together they come to a halt in front of her boxing gym.

He states the obvious: “The place looks closed.”

“It’s three in the morning,” she hisses with effort as she forces the metal gate, “what exactly did you expect?” Finds his hands curled under the bottom and pushing up with her when she glances in his direction.

She has never taken anyone here.

He observes the worn but well-cared-for surfaces with a critical eye. “Next time we use the Institute’s facilities.”

“Brat.” She already regrets the sight of Jace in this room. Jace sliding off his jacket, Jace unlacing his boots. “The mundane world has its charms if you’d just—”

“Look, I didn’t—” he interrupts, “I just mean that this isn’t exactly the neutral territory you promised, is it?”

“It’s close enough,” toeing off her heels, she steps onto the floor with bare feet and closes her eyes at the familiar sensation. 

“No way,” his tone is shrewd, “this is your home.”

He’s wrong. The Hunter’s Moon, the Jade Panda, shoulder to shoulder with the members of her pack—that was home. Her apartment, a place to sleep. Her laundromat, a place to wash her clothes and catch endless episodes of _Wheel of Fortune_. 

This is where she goes to be alone. 

She tosses him the roll of athletic tape she keeps in a locker there and watches him wrap his hands with a thoughtless efficiency, discontent growing heavier in her chest. Pictures Jace at five, going through the same motions with less coordinated limbs.

He voices a searching “What?” as he hands the tape back to her, then, “Already regretting asking me to spar with you?”

“I’ve kicked your ass before, Shadowhunter,” comes easily. 

He pulls himself through the ropes and up into the ring at the center of the space. Paces, feeling it out, now clad in just black jeans and a gray t-shirt, “Any ground rules? Runes? No runes?”

“I don’t know. I can deadlift two hundred fifty pounds—” her mouth quirks up into a fleeting smirk when he whistles appreciatively. Back to business, “How about you?”

“Two eighty-five without runes.”

“Close enough.” She finds spare gloves hanging a few lockers down and brings them to the ring for him along with her own. “How fast can you sprint a mile?”

He chuckles at her continued inquisition, “I have no idea.”

“Maybe use one for speed.” Eyeing him up and down, she concludes, “And take off your pants.”

“I know I’m hard to resist—”

She gestures at her tank top and miniskirt, “Look at me, look at you. It’s not like I haven’t seen everything already.” 

He takes her in for a long, silent moment. She imagines what he sees: her hands in fists, shoulders tensed up so high they practically meet her ears. Wild eyes flashing an unnatural, neon green. He unbuttons his jeans with a purposeful slowness, slides down the zipper and steps out of each leg. His boxer briefs are also black, and he walks unselfconsciously to the edge of the canvas. Tosses down his pants to join the pile of their other discarded belongings.

Her spine itches with the urge to shift. Maybe she should. Maybe he’d—

“Listen,” he disrupts her train of thought, facing her again while fastening his gloves. “I meant what I said before. If you want to talk about what happened with Simon—”

“I don’t want to talk,” she focuses on securing her own. “I want to fight.”

“Spar,” he corrects.

“Spar,” she parrots, and hits him hard in the abdomen. Feels the impact ratchet up her arm.

He bends forward at the waist but betrays no other sign of pain, both hands lifting up to protect his face as he takes a step back from her. “Cheap shot, Maia.”

“First one always is.”

They circle, both bouncing lightly on the balls of their feet.

She strikes first again with a left jab, “But the second—” _you deserve_.

He rotates his body and steps back with his right foot, dropping his arm and moving with her fist as it collides with his shoulder, putting him in the perfect position to respond with the full force of a right counter cross to her side. It’s going to leave a bruise, and she wheezes out a small groan before clamping her mouth shut.

“You were saying?” he teases, cocky.

She feints with her left arm again and he’s a split-second late to respond, not expecting it. Allows her a solid uppercut to his chin with her right. Instead of breaking she goes in again with her right and a snarl, but he maneuvers inside the punch and clinches onto her. 

“Let go,” she fights against the bulk of his body.

“Simon wasn’t trying to hurt you,” Jace’s teeth knock against her neck as she struggles to land a hit that’d make him disengage. She smells blood. His. “He was trying to protect you. I know that doesn’t—”

“I don’t care,” she kicks out to trip him and they both tumble down, her on top. She flips his body until his face smashes into canvas. Holds his shoulders down with all her might and counts up towards ten, breathing heavy, the numbers in her exhales. Jace doesn’t protest that she’d broken the rules, or try to fight out from under her. Lifts one arm up to press his glove to her temple and breathes in time with her. They stay like that long after “ten.” 

“Sorry,” she slumps to her knees next to him, after. “I’m sorry.”

“Why?” he flops onto his back and works a hand out of a glove to test the mobility of his chin, touch the bit of blood leaking from his lips. 

She shakes her head. Doesn’t trust herself to answer. 

His next question is not a surprise to her: “Do you feel any better?”

Yes. “Yeah.” 

Remembers how they first met, and the sound of his voice desperate and hoarse when he told her she could kill him, she really could—just not yet.

“Good,” he responds. “That was kind of the point. We’ll call it a draw.”

She barks out a laugh, gloved hand reaching up to cover her mouth to muffle the sound. Then, “Yeah, right. You only landed one hit. Round two?”

“You wish.”

Watches him clamber back up into a standing position and slip out of the ring. Jace, pulling his clothes back on. Jace, telling her he needs a drink. 

She bites her lip. Will remember this.

.

  
honey blossom margarita  
2 oz herradura reposado tequila  
1 oz lime juice  
1 oz orange blossom honey water  


There is one rule: no talk of exes. They waste time at the Hunter’s Moon, and her boxing gym, and once at a Bruce Lee retrospective that had quickly turned into a bizarre sort of _Pygmalion_ —Maia schooling Jace on proper movie-going etiquette. He’d never been.

“I’d find you profoundly ridiculous if I didn’t also think your upbringing was so damn sad.”

“Yes,” tossing a popcorn into a high arc in the air and catching it in his mouth, “I believe that is the basis of my appeal.” Crunching thoughtfully, “Well, that and this,” he’d then motioned at his face, “obviously.”

Nose scrunching with distaste, she’d wanted to shove a whole handful of popcorn down his throat. “I take it back. You are, in fact, ridiculous.”

Tonight, he doesn’t want to talk, or even really think—if they can manage it. She suggests Pandemonium. 

“Neutral territory.” 

It’s not his worst idea. “So, like, a club in the city neutral?”

He cocks his head, “Manhattan?”

“Yeah, genius.”

“And we’d get there,” he pauses, grimacing, “on the subway.”

Snorting, “It’s hell on my senses, too, but it’s cheap and quick.”

His smirk is too hesitant to truly grate on her, “My favorite kind.”

They end up at a place with black and white checkered floors and walls covered alternately with palm frond wallpaper and large swaths of graffiti that looks like it had been smudged on with bright red lipstick. She doesn’t care. The music is deafening. The pulsing, multicolored lights give the illusion that she can see both everything and nothing at all.

After a few margaritas shared in thorough silence, she grabs his wrist and heads towards the dance floor. It’s impossible to move without slamming into another person. The scents are jarring, and breathing through her mouth to avoid it leaves her lightheaded. Jace circles an arm around her waist, his body plastered to hers as they move.

“Hey, presumptuous much?”

He doesn’t seem to hear the specific words, but gets the gist from her body’s response. Yells over the music, “You want to dance with someone else?”

She doesn’t. Grinds against him, one arm curving to sling around his neck and the other in the air, elbow bent to rest on his shoulder. Closes her eyes at his hips moving against hers, the strength of his legs taking on part of her weight. 

At first, she assumes someone had rammed into them when Jace’s body jostles and he stumbles to one side. But then he releases her, threads through the crowd with an air of urgency that leaves her mind whirring with confusion. A beat, and she’s moving, too.

Finds Jace in the alley outside the back exit. He’s dropped to his knees, one hand on the grimy concrete beneath him and the other clutching at his forehead.

“Hey!” Panic thuds roughly in her chest at the sounds he’s making: half choked sob and half scream, “What the hell is going on?”

He can barely speak, “Please,” his upper body shakes violently, “just be quiet, for a minute.” 

He doesn’t look up at her as she presses a palm to the crown of his head, the other on his bicep to try and hold him up.

“Jace, you’re—” he jerks out of her grip for a split-second before she grabs on again, now also on her knees, both arms holding him up by his torso, “you’re scaring me, okay? What the hell is happening?”

A few more seconds of her head buzzing with anxiety as Jace convulses, her fingers twitching against him, and he stills, back slumped against her front. There are tear tracks on his cheeks that he rubs away with the back of a hand.

“Jace?”

“Hey,” he rasps.

“What was that?” When he doesn’t answer, she shoves him off and stands, face hot. He slumps forward before pressing up onto his feet to face her. “Do you really plan to carry whatever it is on your shoulders in silence forever?” She holds a breath as he presses his hair back from his face to look at her unobstructed. Tries to rein herself in, “Talk to me.” 

It’s the last thing he wants to do. It was the whole point of the night. 

“Okay, fine,” she mutters, and turns to leave.

To her back: “I died that night. The night Valentine—” his voice dips into an uneasy pause. “He stuck a knife in my chest and watched me bleed out in the dirt.”

She pivots back towards him, but doesn’t take any further steps one way or the other. “I don’t understand.”

His smile has a distinct, familiar sadness to it. “Sure you do.”

She had never told him about Jordan. Not specifically. Not even when her ex had showed up in Brooklyn with a few apologies and even more excuses. Breaks eye contact, feeling transparent. Sighs, “Jace.”

“Told me that he had to.” The lack of bitterness in his voice, the lack of anger, is chilling. “Called me his son.”

Jordan had said that she was his, before. And after. That she could never escape.

“I don’t,” _believe you_. She doesn’t voice the end of the sentence, already barreling past incredulity to, “How are you still here?”

“Clary,” he finally breaks their rule of the night. “I told her once that you couldn’t know what would come back, that there were too many risks. She never listens.” 

With a painful twinge of something she will not call jealousy at the base of her throat, “She loves you.”

“I don’t know if I’m even me anymore, Maia.”

“Is there anything else?” she presses, hair prickling and rising on her forearms, “Something other than these, like, seizures?”

“Yeah,” he answers simply, and does not elaborate.

“I swear, I am going to strangle you.” Takes one step in his direction, then another. “You want a clear sign that you haven’t changed a bit? That’s one.”

He laughs, the sound so light and good-natured that it jolts her into joining him thoughtlessly, instinct. The giddiness fades almost immediately, but so does some of the edge, the dark thoughts.

“I’ve been having visions, hallucinations, I don’t know what to call them.”

“Of what?”

“Jonathan, mostly,” his matter-of-fact reply, as if it made a sort of sense to him. “He wants me to kill her.”

Goose bumps again, “Clary?” He nods. “Just Clary?”

He shoves his hands into the pockets of his jacket, “So far.”

“Wow,” eyes wide, mouth parted, “That is a lot to take in.”

“I was trying not to drag you into it.”

“I appreciate that,” she cannot help a small chuckle at how bizarre her world can find it in itself to be. “Does anyone else know?”

“No.”

“So, that’s why you’re not with her?” 

His eyes flit down to her lips and back to meet her gaze, “Not really.”

.

  
wax poetic  
2.25 oz tanqueray  
1 oz honey simple syrup  
0.75 oz fresh lemon juice  


The bar is empty. On rainy nights, it was usually one or the other—a ghost town, or a bar full of strangers trying to duck out of the downpour. She pictures her regulars safe at home, curled up in a chair, reading. The bar is warm, and dry, but it wasn’t a soft blanket and the comfort of stories that end.

She polishes the glassware, and experiments with ingredients for new cocktails, and reads a chapter of _Middlemarch_. 

Jace lets in a spray of rainwater with him and sits heavily on a stool in front of the bar with an exasperated huff, soaking wet. She can hear drops accumulating into a puddle at his feet.

“I assume there’s a rune for that?”

He’s incredulous, “For what? Drying off?”

“Sure,” she grins. If she focuses, she can feel it in her cheeks, and the muscles of her jaw. 

He half stands and runs his hands through his hair to wring out some of the water. “The runes we’re taught are ones that could be useful in combat.” Peels off his coat and sits again.

“You could die of hypothermia,” she offers. Ignores how his wet t-shirt clings to his body, and replaces it with her memory of the tremors and visions he’d only just conquered. “I can’t imagine a dead soldier is a useful one.”

Crossing both arms over the bar, he leans forward and croons, “Should we both take our clothes off and huddle for warmth?”

“Tell the truth,” she flips a clean rag onto the countertop, but does not release her hold when he grabs onto the other end. “Do you consider sex a combat situation?”

“No,” he is not thrown by the question. “Do you?”

She lets go of the rag with a put-upon sigh. “I don’t know. It depends.”

A beat, and, “Was it like that with me?” 

It’s the first time either of them had ever spoken aloud about that night behind her bar. It’s not the first time she’d thought about it. Shakes her head, “Hardly.”

“Good,” he says, and uses the towel to further dry his hair and face.

She asks him what he wants to drink.

“A beer. Whatever stout you have on tap.”

“You know,” she grabs a glass decidedly not meant for beer and enjoys his frustrated groan, “if you had just added a ‘please’ to the end of that request, I might have considered it this time.”

Embarrassment flashes across his features before he turns skeptical, “Really.” 

“Nope!” She combines gin, lemon juice, and syrup, shaking it up lightly before portioning into the coup. “I was bored and made a simple syrup from honey instead of sugar.” Adding a sprig of thyme on a whim, she slides it over and observes how he reacts to the first sip—a grimace. Jokes, “Like it?”

“Bored, huh?” Another sip, another grimace. “Want to get out of here?”

“I can’t just close down the bar.”

Downing the last of the drink, he hisses at the final sting, “Why not?” 

“Because this is the real world, Jace.” She takes the glass, carefully avoiding his fingertips, and refills it with the remaining mixture in the shaker. Hands it back. “Real people rely on this place to be open when we say it will, and I need to pay real rent.”

“Noted.” He toasts her, then swallows the whole drink in one long gulp.

Grabbing a broom and moving out from behind the bar, she mutters, “Why are you even here?”

“I wanted to see you.” He approaches her in a roundabout way, picking up chairs and setting them upside down on their tables. “Did you want to see me?”

“I guess,” she gives, “I’m curious to see how this will turn out.”


End file.
